I don't NEED any handguns really. Lucky for me, NEED isnt the standard for what is and isn't a right. Does anyone really NEED free speech? People live, grow old, and die just fine in places where free speech, firearm owndership, and many of the other rights we hold dear don't exist.

WANT! That is what makes America. How many handguns do I want? I don't know, gimme an infinite amount of money and I'll keep buying them till I don't want any more. Then we'll both know.

Someone actually put together a 'minimum' list about eight or ten years ago called 'Nine Guns', from which the minimum number of handguns an individual needs can be derived. I present here for your amusement, the original text of 'Nine Guns':

Nine Guns

This treatise on the number of guns an individual should own has been adapted from a message posted on the E-Mail network of a Northwest employer during a discussion of gun ownership.

One of the questions I run into frequently when I mention my collection of firearms is, How many guns do you need?" I'm sure y'all've heard questions like this as well, so I thought I'd share the answer I've developed over the years:

Everybody needs nine guns. The response to this is inevitably "Are you nuts? What do you need nine guns for?" I will admit that nine sounds, to the uninitiated, like an inordinately large number, so I provide a list of the nine guns: Everybody needs;1) a plinking* handgun,2) a plinking rifle,3) a carry handgun,4) a backup carry handgun (for when your primary carry is in the shop),5) a carry backup handgun (for when you empty your primary carry at the bad guys and they still keep coming),6) a hunting handgun,7) a hunting rifle,8) a high-capacity semi-automatic rifle (for episodes of civil disobedience where there are lots of bad guys like in the L.A. riots, and cause they're FUN, darn it), and,9) a shotgun.

And, I add, when you've obtained all the guns you need, then you can start on the guns you want!

Feel free to share this with your friends and convince them that you're a nutcase. :)

(employee's name responsible for this essay deleted to protect the guilty)

Sooo . . . the minimum number of handguns you need would appear to be at least five. And this is just the need list :-)